Despite a 2.4% fall in the most recent Global Dairy Trade Auctions (GDTA) ongoing increases in dairy product prices – particularly butter – over the course of September and following on the sustained increase in the last 6 months should deliver a further price increase for Irish dairy farmers in their September milk payment according to Gerald Quain, Chairperson of ICMSA Dairy Committee. Explaining the GDTA fall, Mr. Quain said that some price slippage in SMP and WMP was overstated in the GDTA because both have a disproportionate ‘weighting’ in the calculation in the overall GDTA index but he maintained that underlying European and Dutch market indicators continued to perform strongly and he cited three significant indicators that justified a price rise for last month’s milk supplied.

“The Butter/SMP combination in the Dutch quotations is returning 41.6cpl after deducting processing costs and adding VAT. At EU level and based on EU Market Observatory data, the butter/SMP combination is returning 44.36cpl before processing costs with WMP returning 40.9cpl. Monthly milk spot prices within Italy and Netherlands as reported by the same EU Market Observatory are returning 44.2cpl and 41.9cpl respectively. The overwhelming evidence from the market is positive and indicates returns over and above where current milk price in Ireland stands. ICMSA expects to see that reality reflected in a minimum price of 37 cpl and Ireland moving up the EU milk price league from its present poor 11th position for the highest paying processor – a position which, we repeat, is unacceptable given our investment in moving to value added processing and our unique grass-based marketing advantage”, said Mr. Quain.